#365DaysOfHabits Day 8; Let’s say Harry meets Sally, no wait…Harry meets Taylor. (14 January 2015)

Why do we postpone things? In life — in our jobs and our personal lives? It is so easy to simply put something off or utter that mind numbing phrase that seem to escape our mouths so quickly: I’ll do it later, or, I’ll do it tomorrow. This is exactly the damage we do to ourselves that we later wound up wondering about and asking why our lives are so disorganised and why all of a sudden the craziness has kicked in. We create a struggle not only for ourselves, but also for others. By simply getting the job done, finishing it off and giving it the old tick in the box, we keep things in order. This does by no means mean that life is boring, predictable or dull — life can still be exciting and enjoyable by not putting off what will inevitably come back to bite you in the ass. Why do we do this? How is it easier for us to decide that we’ll do tasks at a later time and then wind up getting to that later time and the pile you have collected for yourself has the circumference of the Rungrado May Day Stadium? We battle to understand why life gets so busy and why we never have time to do anything — and by anything I am not even referring to the social aspect of our lives. Coming from studying event and wedding coordination, I have learned the valuable lesson that is organisation and planning! Having seen how easy this can make life I had that very Oprah ah-ha moment. Even through that though, I still tend to find myself falling in the pitfall of deciding that I’m not going to do something right away.

People don’t realise this, but they work this into what is disguised as New Year’s resolutions, or nutritional diets — even buying something like an iPad or hiring a party planner. Why do I say this? We need a reason to get things done, to actually get up and do those things that is actually a very simple decision and that just requires a little bit of willpower and persistence. We are all on Olympic athlete level when it comes to being persistence, of course this only applies to those things we really want. We want to live a healthy lifestyle, not be so tired day in and day out and that we will have more energy and brain power to get all our heaps of work done. Excused? Perhaps, but let’s see. If we plan properly then we will have enough time to get to everything we need to do and get enough sleep — which, essentially, is such a vital part of our existence. We steer away from making use of our set work hours, which for most people is from about eight or nine in the morning, to roughly five or six in the afternoon. We fill our days with having breakfast, lunch, snacks, going for smoke breaks, making small talk and in the proses not getting to the work we need to do. What does this mean? It means that we wind up staying late at the office, working through the night and going to bed in the wee hours of the morning, only to get up before dawn to start a new day. This can so easily be avoided. By not getting enough sleep, we naturally get tired and this only builds up. We start slacking at work and moving at a slower speed than normal, which means that the pile on our desks pile up. Now we resort to making use of meds and new diets to give us energy so that we can complete our daily work — when in actual reality, all we need to do was first, plan, and second of all, actually just sit down and do our work.

We buy iPad’s with the idea that it will organise our lives and make life easier — which, it does. I am not against having an iPad — I am against the way it is being used. What does this do — or a cellphone for that matter? We receive emails on it and is open for communication at all hours of the day, and night. When receiving an email at seven at night, why is it opened, paid attention to and a reply typed out and returned to the sender? Yes, well, Andrew, you just told us that we need to not postpone things. Yes, true, but by replying to that email aren’t you doing just that? Seven at night was not designed for still being busy with work — this is when you pay attention to you — your household, eating dinner, getting in some exercise, taking the dogs for a walk , etc. Our minds never shut down and this causes us to go to bed at night and not getting proper rest. We have gotten use to thinking it is okay to still work and email people after work hours. It is not, and if you do, have the respect for that other person of not expecting the reply before the next morning, when they are back in the office or start their working day from wherever that might be.

So how do you argue hiring a party planner, you studied that, are you saying we need to put you out of a job? This is more the principal that I want to focus on. Oh, no, now that it effects you, now you want to shift the perspective? A party/event/wedding planner is there to make life easier. Companies hire them or a couple that wants to have their big day to be perfect and so that they don’t have to worry about a thing — which is perfectly fine. I’m not saying don’t hire one — by all means, do! I’m saying that we tend to shift the job, do you know what I mean? Whenever we need to do something, we hand it over. We say that we don’t have time. Sure, we are all busy, we don’t have time to get to everything. Companies were created for exactly that reason — to assist in doing tasks that they are professionals at. Yet, where do we draw the line? Where do we say enough is enough, somewhere I have to start doing something myself? When we are young, this is already instilled in us. Now, I won’t go into the conversation about what parents are supposed to be doing and how they should raise their children — mostly because this is not my place, not my job (and now, not shifting the job — they are your children) and probably the most obvious reason: I am a twenty-three year old single guy who doesn’t have children of my own — so really, shall I even try? I won’t go into detail about explaining this, you can figure it out for yourself.

Let’s look at this from a purely business point of view. I spoke with a businesswoman today and she told me how this had happened to her. She was meant to contact someone at the end of last year, but never did. It rolled over to this year and the phone call was going to take place last week, but it never did. It was about something relatively small, but either way. The phone call only happened this morning and far to late really. She was lucky, in that the person she was dealing with was on top of her job and had already started with the task at hand, but what if she wasn’t? What if the reply was that she didn’t have time and that she was busy with another task. This would not have been her problem as she was not contacted about this, nor was it her responsibility. This businesswoman was meant to plan and do things in the right timeframe. So, why, why do we do this to ourselves, why do we postpone things — she asked me. Why do we always leave things for the last minute when the matter is border-lining on happening or falling through? This not only complicates our lives, but also the person on the other end that is relying on us — the situation could so easily be reversed where it is us who is relying on them. If one piece of the train is missing then it sets the entire trip of trail and they won’t arrive at their designated destination on scheduled time. Is it because people simply don’t care and they have the audacity to think, nah, I will do it later, I don’t want to do it now. Couldn’t be bothered less, right?

Now let’s slide into the relationship side of the conversation, the emotional and personal aspect of things. Let’s say Harry meets Sally, no wait…Harry meets Taylor. They start dating and all is well, really well as a matter of fact. It is obviously not all perfect all of the time — there are some scary moment, moments of snow truck accidents, stitches in a hospital room and asking the question: are we out of the woods yet? Somewhere along the line something goes wrong and long story short, and several gossip magazine articles later, they break up and because she is an international superstar and global singing sensation, the trials and tribulations is bound to end up on 2014’s best selling album. Shit, excuse my French, went down and they broke up. Okay, fine, it did result in thousands of magazines being sold, 1989 being far more of a hit and poor old Spotify begging for more.

See what I did there?

Seriously though. Let’s say Harry met Sally. All went well, but then Sally started feeling not so okay with things that Harry did, however, she chose not to say anything about it to Harry. Then she arrived at the point where she started thing, okay, I probably should have the talk with him, but instead of doing it, she put it off for the next day. Tomorrow rolled around and she still didn’t talk to him. A week and a half later she is in tears because she can’t figure out why Harry left her for Trisha. Now she’s the one crying and listening to Taylor, going through a whole box of tissues. Great heartache that very possibly could have been worked out by communicating at the right time and not pushing it aside. Things sometimes work themselves out, but you have absolutely no guarantee. Is it worth having a relationship comes to that point where it ends so badly that you are forced to spend time apart and say you that all you need is some space and distance. It happens, I know, I have been in that very situation — it all turned out for the better, but I would have preferred it play out differently. It’s a two sided thing really, both parties need to be involved in starting a conversation, and not putting it off.

So, why do we postpone, why is it that we keep on procrastinating time and time again? Is it because we the task we are avoiding is difficult? Perhaps it stems from the fact that it will take you too long to complete. A lot of the time the reasoning could be that you think you don’t have enough skill or knowledge to tackle the tsk at hand. Then there’s that matter of being afraid. Or it could just simply be that you are lazy, truth! Whatever the case may be, proper planning and scheduling is key. No need to plan out your life step by step, but creating some organisational structure for yourself can just be so helpful! Lastly, let’s talk serious — postponing or putting off our dreams. Life is far too short not to live a full life, but we are constantly putting of living! The thought of leading such a meaningless existence makes me sick to my deepest depths. Don’t put of your own happiness for even a second, reach out and grab onto what you want in life, work hard for it and never let the fear of striking out keep you from playing the game — as once heard in a childhood favourite. If you keep procrastinating on your dreams you will get to a point, or an age, where you will have regret — and I for one hate regret, I don’t believe in having any of it. So if you argue that up until now I have uttered nothing but absolute uneducated bullshit, that I have no idea what I am talking about when it comes to work or relationships, then its fine — if you want to choose to postpone everything in your career and in your relationship with your girlfriend/boyfriend/family/friends then by all means go right ahead and mark me as a fool and believe not a word I say — I won’t take offence or be angry, no judgement. BUT, if you say that I am mad as a hatter for talking about putting of your dreams and that I don’t know what I’m talking about them kind sir or lady, I do believe you are an absolute fool! Honestly it is your problem, if you want to live an unhappy life of not reaching for your dreams, because you have excuses like you are scared or you don’t have enough money or you don’t have time — I give up on you. We are all busy, we are all scared at some point and honey, know it or not, but we aren’t all overflowing with money. Put off your job, put of your relationships, but don’t put off your life and your dream(s)!

Anyway, that is my pinch of salt. I could go on for days, but for now I will call it a day and sign off. Allow me to just finish this never ending parade of babbling off with some words from the wise. “A dream doesn’t become reality through magic; it takes sweat, determination and hard work.” — Colin Powell. Also, just keep in mind: dreams that take time to turn into reality isn’t called putting them off, it isn’t called giving up on them, it isn’t even called being lazy or not being passionate about what you want it life — it’s called patience. There’s a difference between waiting for something to happen and making something happen. Alright, drive safe, don’t do drugs — peace out!

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